Gene Eliza Tierney (November 19, 1920 – November 6, 1991)[1] was an American film and stage actress. Acclaimed as a great beauty, she became established as a leading lady.[2][3] Tierney was best known for her portrayal of the title character in the film Laura (1944), and was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Actress for her performance as Ellen Berent Harland in Leave Her to Heaven (1945).[4]

Tierney was born in Brooklyn, New York, the daughter of Howard Sherwood Tierney and Belle Lavina Taylor. She was named after a beloved uncle, who died young.[4][page needed] She had an elder brother, Howard Sherwood “Butch” Tierney, Jr., and a younger sister, Patricia “Pat” Tierney. Their father was a successful insurance broker of Irish descent, their mother a former physical education instructor.[4][page needed]

In Tierney's first role on Broadway, she carried a bucket of water across the stage in What a Life! (1938). A Variety magazine critic declared, "Miss Tierney is certainly the most beautiful water carrier I've ever seen!" She also worked as an understudy in The Primrose Path (1938).

The following year, she appeared in the role of Molly O'Day in the Broadway production Mrs. O'Brien Entertains (1939).[4][page needed]The New York Times critic Brooks Atkinson wrote, "As an Irish maiden fresh from the old country, Gene Tierney in her first stage performance is very pretty and refreshingly modest."[4][page needed] That same year, Tierney appeared as Peggy Carr in Ring Two (1939) to favorable reviews. Theater critic Richard Watts, Jr. of the New York Herald Tribune wrote, "I see no reason why Miss Tierney should not have an interesting theatrical career – that is, if cinema does not kidnap her away."[4][page needed]

Tierney's father set up a corporation, Belle-Tier, to fund and promote her acting career. Columbia Pictures signed her to a six-month contract in 1939. She met Howard Hughes, who tried unsuccessfully to seduce her. From a well-to-do family herself, she was not impressed by his wealth.[4][page needed] Hughes eventually became a lifelong friend.

After a cameraman advised Tierney to lose a little weight, she wrote Harper's Bazaar magazine for a diet, which she followed for the next 25 years. Tierney was initially offered the lead role in National Velvet, but production was delayed.[4][page needed] When Columbia Pictures failed to find Tierney a project, she returned to Broadway and starred as Patricia Stanley to critical and commercial success in The Male Animal (1940). In The New York Times, Brooks Atkinson wrote, "Tierney blazes with animation in the best performance she has yet given".[4][page needed] She was the toast of Broadway before her 20th birthday. The Male Animal was a hit, and Tierney was featured in Life magazine. She was also photographed by Harper's Bazaar, Vogue, and Collier's Weekly.[4][page needed]

Two weeks after The Male Animal opened, Darryl F. Zanuck, the head of 20th Century Fox, was rumored to have been in the audience. During the performance, he told an assistant to note Tierney's name. Later that night, Zanuck dropped by the Stork Club, where he saw a young lady on the dance floor. He told his assistant, "Forget the girl from the play. See if you can sign that one." It was Tierney. At first, Zanuck did not think she was the actress he had seen. Tierney was quoted (after the fact), saying: "I always had several different 'looks', a quality that proved useful in my career."[4][page needed][6]

Receiving top billing in Ernst Lubitsch's classic 1943 comedyHeaven Can Wait, as Martha Strable Van Cleve, signaled an upward turn in Tierney's career, and her popularity increased. Tierney recalled during the production of Heaven Can Wait:

"Lubitsch was a tyrant on the set, the most demanding of directors. After one scene, which took from noon until five to get, I was almost in tears from listening to Lubitsch shout at me. The next day I sought him out, looked him in the eye, and said, 'Mr. Lubitsch, I'm willing to do my best but I just can't go on working on this picture if you're going to keep shouting at me.' 'I'm paid to shout at you', he bellowed. 'Yes', I said, 'and I'm paid to take it – but not enough.' After a tense pause, Lubitsch broke out laughing. From then on we got along famously."[4][page needed]

With difficult events in her personal life, including having a daughter born severely mentally disabled, Tierney struggled for years with episodes of manic depression. In 1953, she suffered problems with concentration, which affected her film appearances. She dropped out of Mogambo and was replaced by Grace Kelly.[4][page needed] While playing Anne Scott in The Left Hand of God (1955), opposite Humphrey Bogart, Tierney became ill. Bogart had personal experience as he was close to a sister who suffered from mental illness, so during the production, he fed Tierney her lines and encouraged her to seek help.[4][page needed]

Tierney consulted a psychiatrist and was admitted to Harkness Pavilion in New York. Later, she went to The Institute of Living in Hartford, Connecticut. After some 27 shock treatments, intended to alleviate severe depression, Tierney fled the facility, but was caught and returned. She later became an outspoken opponent of shock treatment therapy, claiming it had destroyed significant portions of her memory.[citation needed]

In late December 1957, Tierney, from her mother's apartment in Manhattan, stepped onto a ledge 14 stories above ground and remained for about 20 minutes in what was considered a suicide attempt.[11] Police were called, and afterwards Tierney's family arranged for her to be admitted to the Menninger Clinic in Topeka, Kansas. The following year, after treatment for depression, she was released. Afterwards, she worked as a sales girl in a local dress shop with hopes of integrating back into society,[11] but she was recognized by a customer, resulting in sensational newspaper headlines.

Later in 1958, 20th Century-Fox offered Tierney a lead role in Holiday for Lovers (1959), but the stress upon her proved too great, so only days into production, she dropped out of the film and returned to Menninger for a time.[11]

Tierney married two men, the first was Oleg Cassini, a costume and fashion designer, on June 1, 1941, with whom she eloped. Her parents opposed the marriage, as he was from a Russian-Italian family and born in Europe.[11] She and Cassini had two daughters, Antoinette Daria Cassini (October 15, 1943 – September 11, 2010)[12] and Christina "Tina" Cassini (born November 19, 1948), born after their first divorce.

In June 1943, while pregnant with Daria, Tierney contracted rubella (German measles), likely from a fan ill with the disease.[11] Daria was born prematurely in Washington, D.C., weighing three pounds, two ounces (1.42 kg) and requiring a total blood transfusion. The rubella caused congenital damage: Daria was deaf, partially blind with cataracts, and severely mentally disabled. She was institutionalized for much of her life.[11]

Tierney's friend Howard Hughes paid for Daria's medical expenses, ensuring the girl received the best care. Tierney never forgot his acts of kindness.[4]

Tierney and Cassini separated October 20, 1946 and entered into a property settlement agreement November 10, 1946.[13] An uncontested divorce followed in California; their final divorce decree was dated March 13, 1948. The couple reconciled on August 19, 1948.[13]

During their separation, Tierney met John F. Kennedy, a young veteran from WWII, who was visiting the set of Dragonwyck in 1946. They began a romance that she ended the following year after Kennedy told her he could never marry her because of his political ambitions.[9] In 1960, Tierney sent Kennedy a note of congratulations on his victory in the presidential election.

Tierney remarried Cassini, but they divorced again on February 28, 1952. "Cassini promised in his 1952 divorce from Gene Tierney that he would write a will leaving both of his daughters half of his fortune".[14] Cassini later bequeathed $500,000 in trust to Daria and $1,000,000 to Christina.[14][15] Cassini and Tierney remained friends until her death in November 1991.

In 1958, Tierney met Texas oil baron W. Howard Lee, who had been married to actress Hedy Lamarr since 1953. Lee and Lamarr divorced in 1960 after a long battle over alimony,[16] then Lee and Tierney married in Aspen, Colorado on July 11, 1960. They lived quietly in Houston, Texas and Florida[11] until his death in 1981.[16]

In 1962, 20th Century Fox announced Tierney would play the lead role in Return to Peyton Place, but she dropped out of the project after becoming pregnant. She later miscarried.[4][page needed]

Tierney died of emphysema in 1991 in Houston.[1] She is interred in Glenwood Cemetery in Houston. Tierney was survived by her daughters Daria and Christina. Daria died on September 11, 2010, aged 66, and was interred beside her mother.

Certain documents of Tierney's film-related material, personal papers, letters, etc., are held in the Wesleyan University Cinema Archives, to which scholars, media experts, and the public may have access.[18]

"Joe Schenck, a top 20th Century-Fox executive, once said to me that he really believed I had a future, and that was because I was the only girl who could survive so many bad pictures." —quoted in The RKO Girls

^Michelle Vogel, Gene Tierney: A Biography 2005. Quote: "Called the most beautiful woman in movie history, Gene Tierney starred in a number of 1940s classics, including Laura, Leave Her to Heaven and The Ghost and Mrs. Muir."

^"The 100 Sexiest Movie Stars of All Time - 71. Gene Tierney". premiere.com. Retrieved 6 May 2014. Tierney, a classic beauty, may at first seem too elegant to be a sex symbol, but her Oscar-nominated performance as the femme fatale in Leave Her to Heaven firmly established her sexy cred. Plus, Tierney owned her look. She didn't let studio executives mess with her hair color or length, and refused to fix a slight overbite, earning extra sexy points for confidence.